


Count Your Cards

by bluebox_dragon



Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: Gen, buddie is hinted at, cheating at cards as a way to form friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-25
Updated: 2020-03-25
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:35:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23304751
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluebox_dragon/pseuds/bluebox_dragon
Summary: “I’m serious about counting cards. Maddie is taking all of my money, and we need to do something about it.” Buck says.“We play for pennies and dimes, Buck.” Josh reminds him.“It’s the principle of the matter.”“Of course it is.”
Relationships: Evan "Buck" Buckley & Josh Russo, Maddie Buckley & Josh Russo
Comments: 4
Kudos: 97





	Count Your Cards

**Author's Note:**

> This is utterly unedited.
> 
> While I do know how to count cards for black jack, I do not know how to play black jack (try to figure that one out)
> 
> Also I made up an age for Josh, because I have no clue and couldn't find an age for the actor.

The text from Buck comes out of nowhere in the middle of the work day, and since Josh didn’t actually have Buck’s phone number before this, he spends 5 minutes debating whether to just delete the text or tell the person they have the wrong number.

Fortunately, before Josh can decide, another text comes through that just says, “this is buck btw”. This context makes the previous message of, “i learned how to count cards, ur gonna help me” make a whole lot more sense. But he doesn’t respond just yet.

“Your brother just texted me,” He informs Maddie when they run into each other in the break room. “Care to explain how he got my number?”

“Oh! Yeah, he said he wanted your number to ‘plan my demise at the poker table’” Maddie laughs. Apparently, Buck’s horrible pokerface extends well beyond the game. 

“That does seem… in line with the text he sent me.” Josh sighs. 

“I don’t want to know.” Maddy says, hands in the air and backing away. “I’ve had to deal with his antics for nearly 28 years. You can handle this one.”

“Abandoning me to your brother doesn’t seem very best friend-y to me.” He calls after her.

“Good luck!” She gives him a double thumbs up.

He texts Buck back, saying, “I’m in.”

————

Bucks calls him that night, while Josh is attempting to make dinner. Attempting may be too gentle of a word, Josh thinks. Burning, or possibly destroying, would be more accurate of a description of what he’s doing to the poor frozen vegetables he’s trying to stir fry.

“We need to meet up. What are you doing tonight?” Are the first words out of Buck’s mouth after Josh answers the phone. 

“Nothing much, predictably.” Josh replies, before realizing that he has no clue why he and Buck need to meet up. He voices this question, and Buck scoffs at him.

“I’m serious about counting cards. Maddie is taking all of my money, and we need to do something about it.” Buck says.

“We play for pennies and dimes, Buck.” Josh reminds him.

“It’s the principle of the matter.” 

“Of course it is.” 

So they decide to meet at a cafe halfway between their apartments. Buck says that the coffee there is delicious. Josh thinks that Buck probably doesn’t need anymore energy at 7:30pm. The kid is like a puppy, constant energy and adorable confusion.

Josh arrives at the cafe first, and grabs a table. He has time to order a chicken sandwich and a decaf tea before Bucks barges into the cafe, carrying a reusable grocery bag. Josh waves at Buck from the pick up station, and points at the table in the corner where he had put his stuff. 

Buck locates the table, and sits down, pulling item after item out of the bright orange bag that he sat on the floor next to him. A deck of cards, a hardcover book, a laptop, and a travel mug. He takes the travel mug with him as he stands up and goes to order.

“What’d you get?” Buck asks once they both settle down at the table.

“Sandwich.” Josh says, then internally winces at how stilted that answer was. 

But Buck doesn’t seem to notice, and says, “Nice!” Very enthusiastically, before proceeding to explain why soup was obviously the better option, and while Josh doesn’t agree at all, he finds himself nodding along. Buck just has that quality that makes you want to believe what he says, Josh thinks.

“So, I think it’s time that we get down to business.” Buck says, and opens his laptop. “How much do you know about counting cards?” 

“Hm, absolutely nothing.” Josh says.

“Perfect!” Buck says, “I did some research, and I think that I reasonably understand how to count cards for black jack. So, I propose we start there!”

“We didn’t even play black jack at your sister’s place last week.” Josh reminds him.

“Yeah, but I’m sure we can persuade them to play black jack next time.” Buck says.

Personally, Josh thinks that this whole plan will end in disaster, and likely he and Buck losing even more money, but Buck seems committed. And, Josh reminds himself, he did already agree to help. 

“Wait, how much do you know about statistics?” Buck asks, tilting his laptop screen down to look at Josh.

“I took stats in college, I think I remember most of it.” Josh says, trying to do the mental gymnastics to figure out how much he remembers from stats. It’s possibly not that much, despite what he told Buck.

“Great! This has almost nothing to do with stats, but understanding stats can help.” Buck says, before spinning the laptop around, and holding out a pair of headphones for Josh. “Watch this video, and then we can discuss codewords!”

Josh raises an eyebrow, but takes the headphones, and watches through the video, even if half of his attention is on Buck, who had pulled a metal straw out of somewhere, and is drinking his cappuccino and shuffling the deck of cards at the same time. When the video finishes, he pulls out the headphones and closes the laptop, which gets Buck’s attention, just as intended. 

“Pretty easy right?” Buck grins, “So next step is figuring out how to communicate with each other about our counts without letting Mads and Chim know.”

“Mm,” Josh hums, “We could use types of alcohol as codewords?”

“Perfect! Maybe wines are low, beers are high, and liquor is zero?” Buck says

“Absolutely not. Wines are high, beers are low.” Josh replies.

“I can work with that!” Then Buck frowns, “We need a plan to start a conversation about alcohol so that this is all reasonable to say.”

“Oh, don’t worry, I can start that conversation no problem.” Josh says. 

“Sweet, let’s practice.” Buck breaks the deck, and deals a hand out on the table. 

————

On Wednesday morning, while Josh is preparing his third cup of coffee for the day, Maddie sidles up next to him, and invites him to play poker with her and Chimney on Friday night, 9pm sharp. 

“Is your brother invited?” Josh asks. Maddie just sighs fondly and shakes her head.

“Technically, yes. But actually, he informed us that we would be hosting poker night again this Friday.” Maddie says. Josh can’t say he’s surprised, since the first text about card counting on Monday morning, Buck had only increased the volume and enthusiasm of texts being sent Josh’s way. 

“He seemed excited about playing again when I talked to him last.” Josh says, and Maddie gives him a slightly weird look.

“I’m glad you’re spending time with someone you don’t work with, but with everything going on,” She gestures to his face where the bruises are still visible, “If Buck is being too much, just let me know, I can talk to him.”

“No, he’s not.” Josh sighs, possibly a tad bit dramatically, “He’s actually a good distraction, from everything else. He’s a good friend.” 

“A friend, eh?” Maddie waggles her eyebrows at him.

“He is twelve years younger than me, and caught up on his little fire-buddy.” Josh says, raising his eyebrows in return.

“Ugh, it’s pathetic isn’t it?” Maddy laughs, “He has no trouble asking out girls, but the second he has a crush on a guy, he can’t remember his own name. I’m actually not even sure he knows he has a crush.”

“He’s still young, he’s got time.” Josh says, the ‘unlike me’ is left out of the sentence, but Maddie seems to pick up on it anyways.

“You have time too, Josh,” Maddie says, putting a hand on his shoulder, “What happened was terrible, but it doesn’t mean that you won’t find your man.” She smiles gently at him, and then makes her way back to her work station. 

He follows after a minute. 

————

Josh finds himself standing outside of his apartment waiting for Buck to pick him up, nearly an hour before they are supposed to be at Chimney’s apartment. He gotten home from work to a text from Buck saying that they needed to meet up early to finalize their plan. Buck also mentioned that he would supply extra wine, so Josh agreed immediately.

When Buck pulls up next to the curb, waving enthusiastically out the window of his jeep, Josh can’t help but smile at the kids antics. He gets into the passenger seat, greeting Buck at the same time. 

“You ready to kick some ass tonight?” Buck says, excitement causing his tone to be slightly too loud for the enclosed space of a vehicle. 

“I’m here because somebody promised me rosé.” Josh says, then quickly rescinds as Buck’s smile drops, “And to kick some ass.” The blinding smile is back.

“You remember everything I taught you? And the code words?” Buck asks. Josh is nearly certain that Buck is vibrating with energy and anticipation. He’s a fucking puppy dog. 

“I remember, and also a YouTube video taught me, not you.” Josh says, as Buck pulls into a parking spot, expertly parallel parking the frankly huge vehicle he drives. 

Josh follows Buck up to the second floor of the building, and into his apartment. It’s much nicer, and much cleaner than Josh has anticipated, given Buck’s age, and what Maddie had told him about Buck’s frat boy-esque previous living arrangements. 

He accepts the glass of wine that Buck offers him, and can’t find it in himself to be surprised when Buck digs out the deck of cards again, wanting a couple more rounds of practice before they bring their operation over to Chimney’s place. 

By the time they leave Buck’s, Josh is two rather large glasses of wine deep, and they had played through three rounds of practice black jack, once with one deck of cards, and twice with three decks, just incase Maddie and Chim tried to outsmart them, according to Buck.

The ride over is uneventful, Josh is just starting to feel the wine that he’d drank, which was probably good, because Buck spends the ride explaining differences in letter frequencies based on what texts are used to gather the frequencies. Josh had lost track of the conversation less than a minute in, and was now resorting to saying ‘interesting’ and ‘hm’ at appropriate breaks in Buck’s rambling. Maddie had warned him before their first poker night that Buck had a tendency to ramble about random topics, and while it was usually interesting, Josh truly couldn’t care less about how often the letter e pops up in written english. 

When they arrive at Chimney’s apartment, Maddie opens the door and greets them both with a hug, and a slap to the back of the head for Buck when he makes a joke about not bringing any wine because he’d drank it in the car.

“We have the table set up, and alcohol is in the fridge, help yourself to whatever.” Maddie tells them, before leaving them in the kitchen. 

Buck grabs a beer, and grins at Josh.

“Let’s do this.” He says, all confidence.

Josh raises his glass of wine in a salute, and follows Buck to the poker table. 

“Alright, alright,” Chimney says, shuffling a deck of cards, “What should we start our night with?”

“How about black jack?” Josh suggests, they had decided that Josh should be the one to bring it up, seeing as Buck would probably give away their entire plan trying to convince them to play that specific game.

“Okay, I can kick some ass at black jack. Take turns dealing?” Chimney asks, and when everyone nods he starts dealing out the first hand. 

The first four rounds go in their favor, the codewords seem to work well, weaving questions like ‘do you need more wine’ and ‘how’s your beer’ into the conversations easily. Josh feels almost confident that he and Buck will come out of this victorious, with Buck’s precious pocket change restored. 

Everything goes to shit during the fifth round. Josh should have expected it, with the evil smirk that Maddie and Chimney shared before the round started. 

“Well boys,” Maddy looks between Josh and Buck, “You ready to admit defeat?”

“How?” Buck demands, “We were counting cards! And you still won!” 

“Can’t out hustle a hustler, kid.” Maddy crows, and then finishes her glass of wine. 

“Okay, first off, please don’t call yourself a hustler. And second, I’m not a kid.” Buck says, and then ducks to avoid Chimney’s hand coming down to ruffle his hair.

“Yes, you are.” Is the unanimous answer. 

When everyone gets up and starts clearing the accumulation of beer bottles, wine glasses, and snack bowls, Buck pulls Josh to the side.

“So, we need a new game plan for next week. Coffee on Monday to plan?” Buck asks, bouncing on the balls of his feet. 

Josh takes a second to appreciate the fact that what had originally been a poker night with Maddie’s single friends has gotten him a new friend, even if said friend is actually just a puppy dog.

“How about instead of cheating, we just work on your poker face. Sound good?” Josh counters, and mentally schedules in coffee for Monday night. Buck grins at him.

“Sounds great.”


End file.
